Town Square

New suit claims high-speed-rail officials 'misled' public

Just weeks after California's high-speed rail project withstood a court challenge from a group of Peninsula cities, the agency is facing another suit from project critics, who argue that the agency building the train system has misled the voters and is acting in violation of state law.

"If only our currently failed transportation system was held up this level of scrutiny. We wouldn't still be saddled with the highway system, the real boondoggle that keeps taking."

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Um, so you're suggesting that the solution to fixing an unsustainable, failing transportation system is to build yet another unsustainable, projected to fail rail system? Please explain how this helps solve the problem.

If the current transportation problems were born from a lack of scrutiny, this only makes a stronger case as to why the HSR project should be held to an even higher level of scrutiny.

And let's be honest, if you think the highway system is a drain on transportation funds, the history of financial sustainability of public rail projects in the US suggest it will only be worse with HSR.

During Jerry Brown's latest campaign for governor, he stated (quite bluntly!) that in spite of his heavy union financial support, he would not be beholden to any union interests. The HSR boondoggle and his threats to cut school funding unless we approved his tax hike put the lie to that statement.

Posted by Old Steve
a resident of Rex Manor
on Mar 20, 2013 at 1:43 pm

The 130 miles in the Central Valley will improve current Amtrak service on the most widely used rail in Calif. Electrifying Caltrain is required to operate HSR, whether it happens now or later. Why aren't improvements at both ends and the middle considered a proper way to start? If public works projects always waited until all funding is secure, nothing would ever get built because rising costs would always eat into project scopes. Once Caltrain starts running EMU's in 2019 or so, the entire outlook for private investment may look radically different. If not, voters will get a chance to kill it all, because additional bonding would be required. Meanwhile everything built with the bond money and the federal money will have added jobs to our economy and value to our rail transportation system. And if gas is $8/gal or so, HSR might even look like a bargain....

Posted by Jim Neal
a resident of Old Mountain View
on Mar 20, 2013 at 4:55 pm

Old Steve I have to disagree with you my friend. Things get built all the time without funding being secure (in the private sector). That is how many entrepreneurs function in this area. High Speed Rail was nothing more than an overpriced scheme to separate taxpayers from their hard earned money with yet another utopian idea, which like all the rest over-promised and under-delivered.

Even if gas is $8/Gallon, it will still be cheaper and more convenient to drive (and probably fly) than to take the train. Tickets for the train are projected to start at $85 each and I am sure that if this thing ever does get built, the cost will probably be more like $200 per ticket! Of course, the government will probably want to waste even more taxpayer money to subsidize this boondoggle in order to make the prices SEEM lower, but in the end, it will be the working people of California who pay the freight!

Why is the government wasting our money on something that most of us don't want and that none of us needs when we have roads that need repair, schools that need funding, vital services that are being cut and entire cities going bankrupt?

As far as the jobs being created, how many? Is it worth 100 BILLION DOLLARS to create 2000 jobs? You can bet they will be mostly government jobs which means that the salaries and benefits will actually be taking money OUT of the economy and not adding to it.

As for voters getting a chance to kill additional funding....yeah, right! I have a bridge I can sell you too.

I was recently in Italy and they have a high speed rail system there. No one here talks about it. Do you want to know why? Because it is an EPIC FAIL! The government there gave up on it after less than 10 years because it was a pig of a money loser! They have privatized it in the hopes that it would succeed and make money, but when I was there I saw that the trains were 98% empty during rush hour going to and from Venice where no cars or even bicycles are allowed!

But of course we're Americans so we do everything better than everyone else.

Posted by tommygee54
a resident of Rex Manor
on Mar 21, 2013 at 2:54 pm

Hey I agree with Old Steve, right in my neighborhood as well. But when all is said and done we certainly do need Caltrain electrified and HSR running in our great state of California. Even if that means running up and down the peninsula.

VW already has an 80mpg car that is sold in London, but shamefully not here in the USA. I wonder if politics has anything to do with it.

I'll still rather drive to LA then to spend it in a sardine packed railroad car. The problem i have with getting so many people together in such a small compartment is the medical reasons. Just think if 1 person on that car had the influenza, or just as bad, bed bugs. grosss.

As for the speed, just think if a deer gets under it's tracks, would the deer live, could it derail the cars? Where are the animal rights people when you need them. Just think if a terrorist somehow derailed the train, that would be a horrible site to see if it smashed up the trains.

Anything going that fast needs to be in the air and not on the ground.

Posted by duane
a resident of another community
on Mar 21, 2013 at 7:01 pm

If all you naysayers were around when Bart was being planned, it would not have been and you think traffic is congested now........Does a person under a Cal train tip it over and does that person live????? Tell that speed thing to the Japanese, Europeans 185 MPH is normal.....And beside, if the deer is under the tracks it's safe.

Posted by Jim Neal
a resident of Old Mountain View
on Mar 21, 2013 at 7:21 pmJim Neal is a registered user.

WOW! I post an opinion and the personal attacks begin!

My dear friend Bruno, I did not pull the number "out of thin air". Why do you make that assumption about me when you don't even know me? Just because you don't like my opinion, it doesn't mean that you have to attack my integrity.

Ok, a little background, since you may not have read my dozens of previous comments and articles on High Speed Rail, or attended the half dozen or so City Council Meeting where I spoke at length on the subject. I also did a lot of research on the topic when I ran for City Council last year and spoke about it during the debates, so I think I understand the issue pretty well.

First, I am just about to finish my Master's Degree in Business Administration with an emphasis on Finance, so I have a pretty good understanding of what projects cost.

Second, I have forty years of experience in watching Government projects overrun their cost projections by 2 to 10 times their original estimates.

Third, the last figures that I saw showed the High Speed Rail Project coming in at $68 million, but based on factor 2 above, I expect the figure to meet or exceed the $100 million cost announced earlier. (If you have examples of any large state or federally funded projects that came in on or under budget, I certainly would love to see them!)

Fourth, the HSR project is currently facing a lot of lawsuits that will take time to resolve and will add a significant percentage to the final cost of the project.

Fifth, the HSR Project will most likely use a large percentage of Union labor. This means that they will be paid prevailing wage which will also add to the cost of the project. (This is not a criticism, it is just a fact)

Sixth, I take public transportation from Mountain View to Berkeley on a daily basis and it costs me over $20 per day round trip using Caltrain and BART on a system that has already been built. Based on that, it is a reasonable assumption that a rail project that has to pay the costs of construction, pay for new rail cars, security, salaries, benefits and too many other things to list here would have to charge something in the area of $200 per ticket for a trip to LA from SF just to break even.

Lastly, you will note that I said "probably", meaning that this is the most likely outcome that I can project based on the information that is available to me.

All that being said, I hope that next time, you will consider that some people actually do think before they speak, instead of trying to attack them because you don't like their opinion.

"If all you naysayers were around when Bart was being planned, it would not have been and you think traffic is congested now........"

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You're comparing Apples and Oranges. BART is a regional transportation project, HSR is a statewide one.

This is a very important distinction because the Bay Area as a region has benefited greatly from BART because of the exponential growth in population and business in this area. Since BART was built, the Bay Area has become one of the engines in the US economy, and a premier place of innovation and technology globally. The fact that we have so many people working in the Bay Area but living elsewhere helps BART be relevant.

HSR does not have those same dynamics. It bridges a transportation gap between 2 regions in the state, which have been adequately served by the existing highways. You don't have people living in LA that commute to SF, at least not in the numbers that would justify HSR. Consider too that BART has been expanded gradually, as demand justified the need. What is being proposed with HSR is a Hail Mary approach of, "Let's just build the whole thing and see how it turns out", which lacks any semblance of good public planning.

This also points out the opportunity costs we sacrifice in doing HSR. I would gladly invest even a 10th of the budgeted HSR funds into BART, and spend the other 90% of allocated funds on other REGIONAL transportation initiatives in this state. Targeted, focused projects will more immediately benefit the highest number of people, and lower the risk of these large public investments through diversification.

Posted by Christopher Parkinson
a resident of Willowgate
on Mar 22, 2013 at 3:19 pm

I am glad there are still the ones like myself who are suing CAHSR. Litigation is needed, the CAHSR and all forms of government are corrupt. Sign into TRAK in Sacramento and you can see what I mean. In the last article some time ago (they need your annual support about $30) they found out that Senator Feinstein's husband is buying lots of acreage in the CAHSR corridor near Fresno. This is a huge scandal as big as the Tea Pot Dome scandal, yet no one and I mean no one has ever done an investigation because the Senator is large and in charge. This paper needs to call TRAK and start using their editors for what is really going on with the CAHSR. I am tired of going to the Sacto Meeting and tire of the debate. However I am happy the litigants are still at full steam not letting up and they get my full support. Not because I don't want it, I want it right.

To me Right is dump CalTrain, their high single voice demand Rothschild ways are also involved here, Get rid of the corridor at grade. Get BART to finish the loop meet the CAHSR in San Jose. Bart is plenty speedy, has a 30 plus year track record of perfect safety (Save Oscar Grant but that BART cops which I think need to get disarmed). BART runs under the rail easement and we never will have a traffic congestion point and cities have no reason to spend tens of millions on traffic mitigation measures. As it sits too the Cal Train corridor is still reserved for Union Pacific transit. Those heavy trains do damage to the tracks and like Europe has learned, you do not mix commercial with HSR. We are being told by insipid politicians that we are doing this however. So the CAHSR down this corridor will crawl. Politicians hate it when I bring up facts, yes this fact has made your bookend argument moot.

All involved at government political levels on the CAHSR are corrupt. If they would hire engineers to head up the CAHSR as TRAK advocates we would be better off. Robert Allen is right we need BART all the way around the nine counties. Then we build the CAHSR to San Jose and an east meeting out 580 going south and north respectively.

Jim Neal is our best candidate for next terms elections. I hope he will think I am too! It's time to clean up council.